Frozen birthday cakes are pretty much a given on our order list each year. Yes, even in the glaring heat of summer it won’t be odd to find us crafting an Olaf from scratch! They’re too much fun… perfect for birthdays. Above is a cute single tier version we created recently. A special little lady turned 2 whole years old and obviously needed a cake to celebrate. You can read more about the different aspects of this sweet design below!
Cute Frozen birthday cake
For a more sleek look we stuck to just a few design elements on the cake itself. On a pale ice blue cake we added some stylised mountains in a blue a few shades darker. A flurry of fondant snowballs trim the base and sparkling snowflakes featured on the front. We then added little Mila’s name in glittering silver painted letters. Obviously for that extra frosty look we lightly dusted the surface with an edible pearlescent lustre.
Yay! Olaf is pretty cool to make (pun intended). The trickiest part are those skinny eyebrows that we cut via hand. We end up working with such tiny features that we do wonder if we should get jeweller’s goggles sometimes! To finish his look Olaf gets a wide toothy grin, big excited eyes and a cute carrot nose to finish.
Of course would it even be a Frozen cake without Elsa? She is featured on top with Olaf having fun in the snow. We are totally loving Elsa’s hair on this cake too. We experimented with a few different ways to give her a dramatic side braid. First we sketched out ideas and then tested some. We settled on the final version because we thought the chunkiness of it looked cartoon-like and fun.
Elsa’s outfit was somewhat simplified as we thought that would lend well with the overall look of the cake. We definitely had to keep her cool train though. We angled it to sit a little to the side. What’s the point of a train if you can’t see it right?
Finally, we finished the this cute Frozen birthday cake with a shimmering silver painted 2! We even debossed it with a sweet snowflake print.
We LOVE Perfect Wedding magazine. It’s an amazing monthly mag that features anything and everything that could inspire your perfect wedding from stunning floral arrangements to delicious cakes! Our picture perfect ruffled peony wedding cake was featured in issue 117 (page 209 to be exact) and recently our freshly baked macarons graced the pages of issue number 121 as part of their sweet wedding favours feature. Glistening from the pages is a photograph of our popular Pink Champagne macarons; pretty pink shells filled with Gosset Grand Rosé Brut NV infused buttercream and splattered with edible 24k gold paint!
Our macarons in Perfect Wedding Magazine… plus a macaron FAQ!
We thought we’d put together a little more information about our most popular treats. Macarons. Possibly the daintiest, alluring and strangely photogenic (if made well) of sweets. They’re also finicky little things and so hard to perfect. A lot of people contact us daily about how our macarons look or make them feel (seriously), what tips can we give them and how they can book them for their birthday/wedding/anniversary/weekend treat. We also get the odd “are they OK for people with nut allergies?”… the main ingredient in them is almonds. So treat (pun intended) this blog post of ours as a sort of F.A.Q on macarons if you will.
Please note: Prices for our macarons are correct at time of press (June 2016), however, they are subject to change.
Do you make your own macarons?
This might sound like a crazy question, but we’ve been asked this A LOT. We found ourselves utterly confused as to why this would even be asked until someone mentioned that they found out a cake shop bought in pre-frozen shells and macarons made by another company. Maybe it’s just the way we are, but that shocked us. Anyway, let’s get to our answer, which is a definite yes. YES we make our own macarons. In fact, we love making them. We also simply wouldn’t get the range of flavours we have if we didn’t. Plus it’s just plain fun for us to whip them up, think of fun flavours, add sprinkles and drizzles, style with them and photograph them. No mass made, pre-frozen, someone else’s hard work here.
How do you make your macarons?
They’re made of two baked shells containing mainly finely ground almond flour, confectioners’ sugar (aka icing sugar or powdered) and egg whites. Sounds simple right? Wrong. Getting our macaron recipe right took a process of 2 whole years of testing various recipes, adjusting amounts and bake times, experimenting with resting various stages or ingredients and also repeatedly banging our heads on the wall. We changed our recipe a total of 18 times before we established the one that worked for us. We even spent weeks baking the shells on different racks in our convection oven and with different brands of baking trays and silicone sheets before labelling each batch and assessing them. Our obsession did get that insane. So the short answer of that question is… our recipe came from hard work, pure stubbornness and a hell of a lot of testing.
Are your macarons gluten free?
Macaron recipes don’t contain any wheat or gluten as the whipped egg white meringue is what makes them rise a little. Some flavours may contain a little gluten in, but this may come from the filling variety. Back in the day we tested amazing flavours like Cookie Dough and Brownie (which may come back so don’t worry). To get the flavour and textures the Cookie Dough included a no-bake and egg-free dollop of chocolate chip dough in the middle of Madagascan vanilla bean buttercream. Brownie featured Belgian chocolate buttercream and a small piece of chocolate brownie in the centre. Both due to the cookie and brownie fillings contained gluten.
Are macarons OK for nut allergies?
The short answer is no. Macarons are created using ground almonds, which definitely aren’t suitable for nut allergies. Some people, however, are only allergic to peanuts and are OK with other types, but make sure that you check with any guests or anyone you’d love to purchase them for!
Can you ship to the US (or any other country outside of the UK)?
No. Sorry, but they just wouldn’t make the journey. They need to be fresh and given the amount of time it could take to get to you they just wouldn’t be. Also, your country may have restrictions on certain food items being sent through international mail. International postage can also get a little rough so these delicate morsels wouldn’t be in a fit state when they finally hit your doorstep!
We get the above question with cakes and cupcakes too and our answer is the same.
Can you ship macarons across the UK?
Right now when it comes to larger quantities (e.g, parties or wedding favours) we sure can! In fact we have a number of macaron orders booked in for 2017-18 for wedding receptions and birthday parties in London, Essex, North Wales, South Wales, Harrogate, York, Edinburgh, Nottingham and Manchester. Our minimum order is 100 macarons which vary in price slightly depending on flavour choices. Macarons that include champagne flavours for example cost a little more than a more straight forward vanilla bean flavour. All our macarons will be baked and filled fresh, packed up in boxes with acid-free tissue paper and other packing materials before being posted out via Next Day/Sign For delivery. We’ll continuously check tracking (as well as send over the details so you can track them yourself too) then text, email or call you (or your venue) to make sure they’ve arrived safely!
How do I store my macarons?
We advise our customers to store them in their fridge if they’re not going to devour them immediately (which to be honest doesn’t always happen - we get a lot of emails for customers who only just managed a few minutes of looking at them before polishing them all off). To make them last even longer a great tip is to transfer them into airtight containers before placing them in the fridge.
When should I eat / serve them?
As soon as possible. Macarons are hygroscopic which means that they soak up the moisture around them and get softer and softer with time. It’s best to enjoy your macarons within the 48 hours of purchasing them so you can taste them at their best of course! If you’re planning a wedding or dinner party make sure that you don’t buy your macarons too far in advance.
There you have it! As well as lots of images of our gorgeous macarons (including a fabulous press article too) we’ve tried our best to answer some of the most frequently asked questions regarding those petite treats. We do get lots of queries every day via email, Instagram comments and Facebook messages about how/what/where/wtf we make and even photograph our macarons. If we tired to answer every single one then we’d never be able to make them ourselves so here are the basics! If you have any quick questions feel free to comment!
Cute themed treats are always a certified winner at every Christmas dessert table. Kids scurry them away to nibble on with marshmallow studded hot cocoas and milk whilst adults will happily sink a sweet tooth into a sprinklecoveredcartoonsnowman type cookie (or several… we’re grown ups and we’re not scared of dentists… much). At this time of the year you’ll want to whip up all kinds of show-stealing desserts, but lack of time, energy and practice can suck you dry. These adorable snowman cookies are pretty pain free you’ll be happy to hear. Not a dollop of royal icing in sight! Head on over to the lovely Craftsy blog for our FREE and easy tutorial on how to make this little cuties!
Royal icing is one of those things that unless you’re a glutton for punishment like us you’ll hate it or feel sweaty and nervous at the very thought of it. That’s OK… a lot of people feel the same way. We’re just weird. Seriously, we get super excited at the prospect of working with it. Even whipping it up in a mixer gives us a strange thrill. Anyway… these cookies are royal icing free. They’re decorated with good ol’ fondant / sugar paste, some blossom dust, black sugar pearls and a smidgen of black edible paint. That’s it. No frightening, fiddly and frustrating royal icing within a 50 mile radius.
The other fantastic thing about these sweet little bites is that they’re easy to customise. Change the colour of its winter hat, add a snowflake pattern on top, change the bobble, add a name, use black sprinkles or edible pearls for the mouth or nose, use light pink heart sprinkles to stylise the rosy cheeks… you don’t have to stick to the design in the tutorial if you don’t want to. Why not go a little glam with burgundy hats jewelled with gold edible sequins and a fabulous gold pom pom. Or don’t have a hat… keep the face fully white with a circle of fondant and then add cool earmuffs with pom pom type balls on each side and a twisted ‘rope’ of fondant spanning from one to the other across the head. Festive and fabulous!
